1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lever type connector having a movable guide member (also called “movable plate”), which is installed in a connector housing having male terminals therewithin, protects distal ends of the male terminals, and assist respective connections between male and female terminals.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 to FIG. 6 show one example of a conventional lever type connector described in Japanese Patent No. 2946000. As shown in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2, the lever type connector comprises a male connector 910, a female connector 920 and a movable guide member 930. The female connector 920 includes an aperture 922 for stowing the male connector 910. The movable guide member 930 is installed slidably within the aperture 922 and slides a connecting direction of the male connector 910. The movable guide member 930 also protects and guides terminals 960 projecting within the aperture 920.
The movable guide member 930 includes a main plate 932 and a pair of barbed arms 936. The main plate 932 has a plurality of holes 934 concerning the mail terminals. The pair of barbed arms 936 extend from both side edges of the main plate 932 perpendicularly to the main plate 932. Each barbed arms 936 has a slit 938 extending in the connecting direction and a pawl 940 disposed on its distal end for temporary engagement. As shown in FIG. 3, the pawl 940 is engaged between projections 926, 928 provided on an inner surface 944 of the aperture 922 and then the moving movable guide member 930 is engaged temporarily.
In addition, a pair of projections 912 is provided on both sidewalls of the male connector 910. Each projection 912 is slidably engaged with the respective slit 938 of the respective barbed arm 936. As shown in FIG. 4 and FIG. 5, during the connection of the connectors 910, 920, the projection 940 firstly gets over the pawl 940 which is held temporarily between the projections 926, 928. An arrow shown in FIG. 4 and FIG. 5 indicates an inserting direction of the male connector 910. And then, the movable guide member 930 is pushed backward by the male connector 910. Next, engagement between the pawl 940 and the projection 928 is released to enable sliding of the movable guide member 930.
Finally, the barbed arm 936 has served its purpose at the release between the pawl 940 and the projection 928 and then stowed at space 929 secured behind the projection 928 with a bend back state. Therefore, continuous bending of the barbed arms 936 is prevented and then occurrence of superfluous plastic deformation is prevented.
In the above-described lever type connector, the spaces 929 for stowing the barbed arm 938 are secured behind the projections 928 respectively. Therefore, a access hole, which is made by a telescoping shutoff of injection molding to mold an undercut portion, is needed on a connector housing of the female connector 920 to secure the respective space 929 at molding. As a result, waterproof structure and enclosed structure are needed for the female connector 920. These structures may produce disadvantageous condition and then it is difficult to adopt the above-mentioned structure actually.
Alternatively, if the spaces 929 are not secured behind the projections 928, the access holes by the telescoping shutoffs are not made. However, the barbed arms 936 may be continuously bent under the connecting state of the connectors 910, 920 and then superfluous plastic deformation may occur with the barbed arms 936. As a result, temporary holding performance of the movable guide member 300 may be reduced.